April - Department of Defence

Hawk Lead-in Fighter
Trainer will lift eyes
The roar
passing on
high.
By Nomonde Vuthela
Photo: Cpl Elias Mahuma
The South African
defence industry
received the first Hawk
MK 120 aircraft on 4
February 2004 at the SA
Air Force Test Flight and
Development Centre
(TFDC) at Cape
Agulhas, the most
southernly tip of Africa.
The TFDC is where
the integration and flight test of the
Hawk Lead-in Fighter Trainer (LIFT)
programme will be conducted for the
next fifteen months. The aircraft has
now been handed over to Advanced
Technologies & Engineering (ATE) to
conduct the necessary flight-test programme.
Although still the property of
BAE Systems it will later be delivered
to Armscor in terms of the contract
entered. For the next few months
experts will demonstrate, fine-tune
and test the required accuracy and
reliability of the avionics and combattraining
weapons suites on the Hawk.
As part of the Strategic Defence
Packages contracted in December
1999, the Hawk Lead-in Fighter
Trainer project aims to replace the
aging Impala Fighter Trainers that
have a proud service of forty years.
This Hawk is the first of 24 fully
operational Lead-in Fighter Trainers
that will be delivered to the SA Air
Force. The aircraft deliveries remain
on schedule, commencing mid 2005
through to mid 2006.
Two major developmental aspects
of the Hawk have been its power
plant and avionics suit, initiatives
that will ensure modern, cost-effective
and Gripen focused fighter training
for the next thirty to forty years.
The integration of the Hawk and the
Gripen light fighter acquisition programmes
should lead to significant
benefits for the SA Air Force.
As the Chief of the SA Air Force,
Lt Gen Roelf Beukes, explained to all
present: aligning the functional
design and support planning phases
of these two aircraft systems will
ensure a logical progression from the
Astra to the Hawk and the new generation
Gripen combat aircraft.
The Hawk handingover ceremony
and inaugural flight witnessed by all
key players was a milestone on the
programme. It coincides with South
Africa's ten years of freedom and also
the tenth birthday of the SANDF. The
Hawk is a vehicle for transformation
that will see a new generation of
fighter pilots representative of a new
South Africa.
"The selection of the first group of
technical personnel is in the process,
with the focus on identifying black
and female members to optimise representivity,"
noted Lt Gen Beukes.
This is a sentiment also shared by
the Managing Director for Hawk
within BAE Systems, Mr Mark
Parkinson, who said this aircraft and
others joining it will play a vital role
in the training and education of a
new generation of young South
African professional fighter pilots.
"While they are among the finest
examples of efficient, capable and
modern military technology, they also
represent two most important vehicles
for transformation in South
Africa," said Mr Parkinson.
According to Mr Parkinson South
Africa joins seventeen other air forces
and customers around the world to
have selected Hawk for its Lead-in
Fighter Trainer. In South Africa it is
being tailored to prepare pilots who
will graduate onto the Gripen multiswing
role fighter. "It is the first time
BAE Systems has ever outsourced an
avionics integration contract and it
demonstrates the confidence we have
in ATE and its various South African
partners and subcontractors,"
affirmed Mr Parkinson. The total
industrial participation commitment
from BAE Systems for the Hawk project
is $USD 680 million.
By the time the Hawk is delivered
into service next year BAE Systems
will also be celebrating ten years in
South Africa. May the next ten years
of South Africa's young democracy
see further forging of ties and bonds
in the quest for technological advance
and good business.
A P R I L 2 0 0 4
S A S O L D I E R
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